Tuesday, May 27, 2008

I haven't felt up to posting anything on this series so far because there's not enough space on this entire site for me to write about everything that has annoyed me in this series.

Basically it boils down to this. The Wings are getting all the bounces and the Pens are simply not.

Let's go back to Game 1 in the first period. The Pens had 2 pucks lying in the crease behind Osgood and just couldn't slam it home. Another puck took a nice hop off the endboards, hit Crosby in the chest and bounced behind Osgood who had to reach back quickly to keep it out of the net. By my count, that would have made it 3-0 if we were catching bounces and there's no way we lose after that.

Plus, let me bring this back up again because I'm feeling vindictive. Back at the trade deadline I spoke out about the Hal Gill trade. For the most part he's actually been very good and a pleasant surprise. It seemed too good to be true and guess what? It was.

Have you seen how pathetic he's looked against the lightning quick Detroit forwards? It's sickening. Not to mention, how does he get rocked by Samuelsson which led to the Wings 2nd goal in Game 1?

Are you kidding me?

Big, bad, giant Hal Gill gets taken out of the play by a midget by comparison and the puck ends up in the net. I knew this was a bad deal and that it would come back to bite us eventually and it completely has. Here's what you do with him now. BENCH HIM. We have Darryl Sydor who we're paying a disgusting amount of money to be a professional bench warmer by my last check. Was he awful during the season for us? Yes, but can it possibly get any worse than Gill? At least Sydor has experience against these Wings and being in the Finals.

Let's also look at something so fundamental it's disgusting that I am sitting here typing this.

PUT THE PUCK ON NET!!!!!!!

For the first 14 games of the playoffs the Pens had no trouble dumping and chasing and crashing the net. They also threw everything on net all the time. All of a sudden they get into the Finals and continually try to make cute and fancy passes through the neutral zone. I'm fairly certain you could count on one hand the number of times the Pens have dumped the puck in and gone in after it. Just like you can count on one hand how many shots on goal they've gotten while playing 5 on 5.

Did I expect Pittsburgh to win this series. Not really. Did I hope they would? Of course, so why am I so angered by how they've played thus far? Simple. I expected them to compete and at least give the Wings a run for it. They still could I suppose, but it's going to take a lot of changes and some bounces to start going our way for that to happen.

Side note: what was the NHL thinking having a 3 day gap between Games 3 and 4? Really? Why is Game 3 on Wednesday and not Thursday? Give the teams an extra travel day. Now if the Penguins do win Game 3, any momentum they generated will be dead by the time Game 4 gets underway. Way to go Gary Bettman, just another folly for a list that's already a mile long.

I haven't totally given up hope, but I'm on the brink. Like I have said before. I'm a Red Sox fan, so I've seen worse situations turn into glory. The only good thing is that we head home for the next two games. If we somehow win the next two games, I may have cause to start believing once again, but we need to put a puck in the net.

Write this down. If the Pens get a quick goal in the first period tomorrow and lead after the first, we're at least going back to Detroit for a Game 5.